Letters
by indignant mushroom
Summary: Thane continues writing to Shepard from across the sea. This is one of his letters, the first in a series of prayers written in sand and carried away by the tide.
1. Siha

_Siha._

The sand is warm, but it feels cold against the memory of your hands. The desert ends far beyond this shore, a mountain range of golden peaks never-ending, kissing the horizon like broken pieces of stained glass. The winds blow and create currents in the dunes, waves of mustard yellow and cinnamon. Here the ground is not stained in red; it is soft, like the memory of your skin under my fingertips.

I woke up under the shade of a tree, the desert sea behind me, and cool cerulean water tugging at my feet. For the first time in a long time, I was able to breathe in the air around me without protest. It tastes of rebirth, of peace, of calm—but it does not compare to the taste of your mouth against mine.

I've come to the shore alone, _Siha_, and although many other travelers have crossed my path to journey beyond the desert to some finer place, I have stayed. They go to the life beyond this shore, and if their paths are true they will find their way home with their loved ones on the edge of the waste, to the wates of another life. Many have invited me to walk with them, to move on and accept my passing, but they do not understand. I do not stay on my own behalf.

It is with this thought that I selfishly write to you, _Siha_, waiting for you to wash up on shore like a piece of driftwood. I walk as far as I dare each day, pacing a small track of beach that many others wash up on. Whole families have come together, husbands and wives, children, mostly drell like myself. One day I found a boy no older than Kolyat, and I prayed for his family, and for his mother who followed him days after. It is one of my greatest fears to one day find my son wandering the sand, his life behind him and a cold, lonely journey before his feet.

Time passes differently here, I am not sure if minutes have passed since my death, or years. Whatever the case may be, I hold on to hope that you fulfilled your purpose and lived the remainder of your days with passion and integrity. But selfishly, I wish for you, _Siha_.

Sometimes a storm cuts off just beyond the horizon and it carries the winds to me, and all I can hear are the death throws of the dead as they sail through the storm. All must pass into the grey before they reach the shore. I do not remember much of my own crossing, only that it was filled with every memory of pain and regret that I lived in my lifetime. I opened my eyes in the water and screamed, and it filled my lungs and pulled me down into the darkness until I found the will to start swimming. Once I breached the surface, the pain resided, and I knew the worst was over. I know you will face your own drowning with the same ache in your bones, but do not let it consume you. Do no give in to the water, or it will swallow you whole.

I pray for you, _Siha_, every morning as the sun rises. This shore is lonely, and sometimes cold, but I promised you that I would be here to greet you when you come. I will wait as long as it takes, and hope that this prayer reaches you when your soul departs your world and sustains you when you feel like giving up.

I will love you always, Shepard, and I will wait for you here, across the sea.


	2. Kalahira

Kalahira.

I ask forgiveness, Kalahira, for this one's ungraciousness and ingratitude for all which you have given; your golden shores and waters that never darken, and days that never see the rain. I see a paradise beyond these dunes, yet there is no paradise here for me here. I have not yet stepped beyond the tide, as it shall bring me no peace of heart.

For the traveler that does not walk may never tire, and the lover that has never been may never leave. I have no appetite and yet I starve.

You have set me on your shores as sinless as a child, yet with great selfishness I plea to you a favor to curb this melancholy, for I am lost in another. Without her I shall never feel the kindness of your mercy, nor the infinite peace of the spirit. Lost I will remain on your shores, unguided, staring out into the never ending storm beyond your waters.


	3. PTSD

Seven years passed since Shepard walked into the red haze that brought the Reapers tumbling down to the earth. She'd spent three of those years recovering in ICUs and therapy to deal with her injuries and trauma, and took daily medication to keep the chronic pain to a minimum. Her Cerberus hardware had fried, left her organs to cook under the weight of rubble until a recovery team found her with half of her face blown off and her bones splintered like wood. She remembers the lights of the operating room; she'd thought that she'd crossed over into heaven, but the smell of pink antiseptic and a steady heart beat told her otherwise. After a new pair of lungs and a new skeleton she felt like a science project, a guinea pig for the latest and greatest medical procedures. The only human things left about her were her scars, and her memories. Some had faded with time, gently and quietly, like the hum of the first Normandy, while others sharpened like the edge of a knife and tore her skin apart. Anxiety rolled in like waves, other times like hurricanes, paralyzing her, rendering her fearful and cold at the foot of her bed.

But she was alive, and that's what that mattered.

She'd been honorably discharged, raised to the rank of Rear Admiral, and received vet benefits for her medical care and a pension that allowed her to live comfortably on the Citadel in Anderson's apartment for a time. The strip proved to be too public for her, too easily accessible for fans and critics and general crowds to gather at her door while she hid in an upstairs closet, hands over her hears and face stained with fear. Sometimes she would stay there for hours or days, sometimes screaming, other times silent, until Ashley or Miranda showed up after a flurry of missed calls and unanswered emails. They'd pull her out carefully, go through the steps and motions to bring her back to life like a doll without batteries, feed her, clean her, making hushed calls at 2am to Chakwas and her therapist when they thought she was asleep.

Some days she'd wished they'd never come, but they always did.

Ashley said she was worried, and Miranda said she cared, but neither of them lived with the nightmares. They were like stones in her pockets, weighing her down in some river deep enough to drown but shallow enough so that she could see the sun shining through the surface. All the killing she had done, the fighting, the dying-Shepard may have been built from metal and wire, but her mind remained an imperfect, organic thing. The doctors diagnosed her with PTSD, anxiety, depression, obsessive compulsive disorder, anything to explain to her friends and crew why she screamed in the middle of the night, why she would never be the same again. She was no longer Commander Shepard, humanity's soldier, protector of the galaxy, but simply Shepard: survivor, celebrity, war hero, broken thing. Something that had served its purpose, something that had been robbed of its mortal glory the day they uncovered her in the rubble. Her legacy would no longer consist of going down with honor, but instead with a slow decline into old age and instability. It was the decay of her previous life that hurt her most, though, the fragments of her mind that remained and haunted her-Virmire, the Collector Base, Earth-things that couldn't be erased, no matter how many pills she ate or how much she drank, or how hard she tried to drown out the sound of Anderson's voice or Kaidan's laugh with the cool side of her pillow.

And nothing could fill the void that was Thane, not a placard or memorial statue or medical research foundation that could ebb the pain of his death. For years she carried it like she carried everything else, heavy on her shoulders, bending her like a sapling against the wind. Her friends seemed to settle down around her as the currents of time slowed, like silt in a river, finding comfort in their new families, slowly licking their war wounds. Tali and Garrus married, even Kasumi parted with her Black Box and settled down with a nice doctor from the Citadel. Liara would come and go, vanishing as she often did, leaving flowers or candy in her wake. Wrex often invited her to Tuchanka to visit his children, and she'd gone once or twice to appease him and stop the flood of emails. Her first visit was right after she was cleared to leave the hospital, wheelchair bound, oxygen tank strapped behind her in case she had troubles with gravity. Joker and EDI joined her, and Vega pushed her along with a gentle ease she'd never seen from him before. He turned out to be her constant companion in her later years, a mix of little brother and caretake she didn't quite understand, but never questioned.

"You look like shit," was the first thing Wrex said when she saw him. And she did. She'd lost half of her body weight since she was found, nothing more than a frail shell of the soldier she used to be. Her legs were healing from being crushed and rebuilt, her arms barely strong enough to carry out daily tasks without tiring, she could no longer hold a gun, and struggled with small buttons or writing utensils. No doubt her face was a mess; she was told that it had been mangled beyond recognition, and believed it by the number of cosmetic surgeries she underwent before they would let her look in a mirror.

Shepard smiled and let out a small, dutiful laugh. "I've seen better, but at least I'm still here."

That was what she kept telling herself. _I'm still here_, as if it was some consolation or small mercy, a gift to her for all she had given, but in reality it was far from. The only gift she'd wanted was a death that had meaning, and the peace of mind that came with being buried six feet under.

It had been a good visit, enough to lift her spirits, only for them to come crashing down her first night in the apartment alone. She'd dreamt of Kelly, of the way her friend writhed in pain and cried out to Shepard for help, fists pounding on the glass of her prison as her skin burst like boils filled with acid. She would dissolve in front of Shepard, awake and screaming, only to return to life the next night and die again. Her house bot, a small glowing globe with a soothing voice (Liara's gift to her), had called Vega in a panic. He found her cowering in the bathtub, carried her to her bed like a child and held her until she fell asleep, calling her _carita_ and telling her not to worry, _No te preocupes, todo irá bien_, that everything would be okay. The dawn would come and they would still be there, Vega's arms around her and Shepard holding on for dear life.

Nightmares like this found her often, try as she could to keep them buried under glasses of warm milk and melatonin and various psychiatric medication. In the mornings her breakfast consisted of small blue, white, and pink pills, colored like candy with none of the taste, enough to fill her stomach and make her feel full. For the first few weeks they'd made her sick, barely able to eat the rest of the day, but with some adjustment she found a balance between quantity and effectiveness. Trial and error, Chakwas said to her at her evaluation appointments. Weekly, bi-weekly, trickling down to monthly and then not at all, they used to be something of a respite for Shepard, a chance to see a familiar face without having to leave her home, at one time the apartment on the strip, and later on the small, tasteful buttercream house with a white picket fence that she'd dreamed of. It was in a secluded sector of the Citadel meant for Earth's high profile individuals and their families. The Normandy crew had pooled money, Hackett and her mother had pulled strings, and on her 37th birthday they'd surprised her with her dream home. Everyone had helped build the fence, Cortez had said, it was their gift to her.

She cried the day they brought her there, Miranda and Kasumi blindfolding her, holding her hands through the door, removing the black bandana over her eyes to reveal the Normandy crew piled into her new living room like sardines. It was the first time they'd been together since her release from the hospital and her return from Tuchanka years ago. The shock was nearly too overwhelming for her, she remained speachless in the doorway until she burst into tears. There were a few familiar faces beyond the crew, the most noticeable being Kolyat. He was in a corner near Liara when Shepard had arrived, hands behind his back, a gesture reminiscent of his father. They'd made eye contact, and later he came to her in the kitchen when everyone else was busy gambling away their credits.

"Shepard," he greeted her, eyes blinking and calm, and the old soldier felt the terror creep into her throat. He was taller, leaner, a perfect picture of Thane before her, something she had never prepared herself for, not something she cared to admit or acknowledge but was forced to as he stood there patiently, waiting for a reply.

"Hello, Kolyat. It's been some time," she replied, forcing her shoulders to relax into a graceless shrug.

"It has. We haven't spoke since you were in the hospital," he shifted, leaning on the island opposite her. "I hope you got my letters."

Shepard forced a smile, suddently too old and too tired to move. "Yes," she said, remembering. There were emails, and hand written letters asking about her health, if she needed anything, how he would visit her when permitted. He'd come a few times, but after her release the visits stopped and the letters became more infrequent and she grew more reclused and as Kolyat grew into his own. He was Bailey's shadow, some dark angel he called on whenever regulations failed to procure results. No doubt Liara had work for him well, far away from assassinations as per Thane's wishes, but enough to keep him busy.

But he had cleared his schedule to see Shepard, after two years, to welcome her home. The sentiment was more than enough to touch her heart.

The drell opened his mouth and closed it again, looking at his feet, and then back at Shepard. "Sinem," he began, and it was the second time he had used her first name since Thane's death, foreign to her ears just as it was to his lips. "It was my father's wish that we stay in touch. To watch over each other as friends would so that neither of us would be alone in our grieving.

"But," he paused, reserved with his words, "I would like to think that it was in hopes that we could be family to one another. It was, I think, his greatest wish."

It was the intimate understanding of Thane's nature that both possessed that, in Shepard's new kitchen on a Saturday night, both promised a memory of a man that they would be the family he dreamed of, a promise that would only last until Shepard died two years later on her 40th birthday.


	4. The Road Not Taken

James Vega lifted the casket from the ground and onto his shoulder, muddying his suit that didn't fit, while Kolyat copied him to his right. Behind them the original Normandy crew did the same, all in unison, as they walked Commander Shepard to her final place of rest.

The funeral was a large, public affair put on jointly by the Alliance and the Citadel Council that Sinem would have hated but nevertheless understood the value of. The day the news broke that the famous Commander Shepard had died the extranet blew up and then shut down as billions of mourners took to fansites and social networks to grieve. James was not one of them. James was the one who found her.

The wake lasted two days as people from across the galaxy made a shrine outside her front lawn, leaving flowers and pictures, poems and small gifts, before the body of the Commander was put behind glass like some sort of twisted relic for the public to idiolize with their cameras. The only venue large enough to house the predicted crowd had a capacity of only 250,000 people, leading to a dozen city blocks being shut down due to excessive crowds waiting to get in line. Shepard stated in her will that it was to be a free event, that at any mention of ticketing she would rise from the grave and cancel the whole thing and demand refunds. The cost of the ordeal would be dealt with later, most likely through the numerous donations that were made. A particularly large sum came from Omega, which paid for nearly half of the expenses.

Shepard's birthplace was a thing to behold. Istanbul was a cultural marvel, a reminder that with the enormity of space the most beautiful things come from the past. The funeral was to be there, a private, mixed ceremony as per her wishes. She did not expect her crew to follow her customs but they did all the same, never crying too loud or too much, fumbling over the words of the Quran. As the procession walked its way to the private plot of land overlooking the shore it was quiet, save for the choking sound of held back tears or the heavy breathing the the pallbearers. Her mother insisted on a coffin, and that her close friends be allowed to attend and speak if they wished, things that Shepard had already acknolwedged in her will. _ Funerals_, she said, _were for the living_, and they should be allowed to mourn her with her own customs, that she _would be honored_ by the gesture.

Hannah looked nothing like her daughter except that she gave Sinem her shining grey eyes. She was a short woman, with white hair and delicate features and pale skin, who read Robert Frost with a wilting, trembling voice of a mother who had lost her only daughter. Beside her a tall, broad man with a peppered beard and dark eyes cast down held on to his wife with strong hands. It was clear to Vega that Sinem had taken after her father Mustafa in more than manner, but in looks as well. He did not say a word, but supported his wife and son as they talked about Sinem with a sad fondess of finality. All of the life had been taken out of them that day.

James wasn't one for words and never pretended to be. He was action, he was all bite with no bark and had the scars to show it. He couldn't be that with Shepard, though, and a new appreciation for words found him in the middle of the early morning when the only thing that would get her to sleep was Robert Frost or Rumi. Reading to her was learning how to read all over again, to slow down and appreciate the syllables and rhythm that flowed from the page like water. It was her final gift to him, something that he'd forgotten to do in his haste to prove himself to the world. Sinem had taught him to slow down and notice the poetry of the universe, in all its sadness and fleeting beauty. So after the Shepard family had finished and the podium left bare, he took his copy of _The Road Not Taken_ and stepped quietly to the front. It was a mix of both Normandy crews and military personel, close family and some school friends that Shepard invited by name. James looked and saw three dozen faces, and each face looked the same. Devastation, anger, despair, sadness, and peace, muddled together in the features of Asari and Drell and Krogan, in Human and Turian and Salarian, in the same ways that James didn't think was possible.

"So I'm not the only one who looks like Hell," he joked softly, and small laughter rippled through the congregation. He saw all of them, each with a piece of Shepard, each with some form of her mark left on them, burning like fire in their veins. "I don't have much to say," he continued, "But, I can read you something. It was the Commander's favorite, or, at least the only thing to get her to sleep at night." The laugh died as the sobering recollection ghosted over the crowd like low hanging clouds. Everyone remembered the reality that they tried so hard to write off and bury under older, more grander times when the Commander wasn't confined to her illnesses.

James cleared his throat nervously and started, "_The Road Not Taken_, by Robert Frost.

"_Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,_

_And sorry I could not travel both_

_And be one traveler, long I stood_

_And looked down one as far as I could_

_To where it bent in the undergrowth;_"

Commander Shepard, who was all action, all choice. Virmire was a choice. Tuchanka was a choice. The Citadel. Each came with their consequences, heavy and everlasting, but that never stopped her from moving forward. As much as she pretended that they didn't haunt her, Vega knew better than most that they did.

"_Then took the other, as just as fair,_

_And having perhaps the better claim,_

_Because it was grassy and wanted wear;_

_Though as for that the passing there_

_Had worn them really about the same,_"

Commander Shepard, who made the hardest choice in life look like the easiest, who gave her life twice over for the greater good, the bright light that drew her in like a moth to flame. An incorruptible dream held together by unbroken belief in one woman who inspired and created hope from nothingness.

"_And both that morning equally lay_

_In leaves no step had trodden black._

_Oh, I kept the first for another day!_

_Yet knowing how way leads on to way,_

_I doubted if I should ever come back._"

Shepard, who had given her only life to make sure that James could live his. So that the galaxy would keep spinning. As James looked over towards the sunset that leaked into the bay, corals and oranges and purples painted on top of deep blues and greens, he suddenly understood with clarity not only why Shepard gave her life, but how.

"_I shall be telling this with a sigh_

_Somewhere ages and ages hence:_

_Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—_

_I took the one less traveled by,_

_And that has made all the difference._"

Sinem, who stopped to count each pebble and to listen to the trees sing in the wind, who stopped to watch the waves and noticed each leaf when it fell to the groud, gave her life for all of the beautiful things that collectively made it worth living. So that the sun could rise and set every day, and so that her friends would be there to see it.


End file.
